


Just To Feel Your Touch

by excessiveprepositionalphrases



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Julian is the softest gentlest doctor in the galaxy, M/M, Medical, Touch-Starved, needy! garak, sorta medical themed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:27:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23861569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/excessiveprepositionalphrases/pseuds/excessiveprepositionalphrases
Summary: A very touch-starved Garak discovers that the touch he needs so badly is only a few steps away. Unfortunately, he'll have to injure himself to have an excuse to feel it.
Relationships: Julian Bashir/Elim Garak
Comments: 54
Kudos: 290





	Just To Feel Your Touch

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [И ощутить твое прикосновение](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25611760) by [fandom Star Trek Prime Universe 2020 (StarTrek_Universe)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarTrek_Universe/pseuds/fandom%20Star%20Trek%20Prime%20Universe%202020), [Natalia1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Natalia1/pseuds/Natalia1)



# Injury One

Elim Garak couldn’t sleep.

This was not exceptionally unusual for him. Sleep never came easy. It never had come easy. He could not think of a time, in his entire life, when he had fallen asleep without meaning to. He had never drifted off on a sofa or dozed in a tub. Sleep was something he had to _try_ to do, and tonight it seemed to want to escape him completely.

He tossed and turned, uncomfortable with the temperature and the state of the bed. But even more there was a feeling he couldn’t shake – like a crawling on his skin. It wasn’t a real feeling. There was nothing to diagnose or treat. It was a feeling that was born entirely of his mind, but it was deeply unpleasant. There was a sort of _squirmy_ feeling on his skin, and something profound in his chest. He wasn’t quite sure if it was anxiety or sadness, or some fear without object, but it was there.

He had hoped that the uncomfortable feeling would be a relic of the wee hours, but as he sat in his shop the next morning, he was painfully aware it was still there. He was ripping a seam, the old fashioned way, with a needle sharp seam ripper and a whole lot of elbow grease, while he desperately tried to psychoanalyze himself. What, he wondered, could be causing him to feel the weight in his chest and the prickles on his skin?

He was, deliberately, too far into his own self meta-analysis to see what was right in front of him. Get good enough at lying, and the easiest person to lie to becomes yourself. He knew. He knew what was wrong with him and what he needed. But he had no desire to acknowledge that, or to bring it out into the open. So he continued to make a big show in his own mind, for the benefit of no one but himself, of wondering what, exactly, was the matter.

Right up until he stabbed himself cleanly in the hand with the seam ripper. He cried out, and quickly looked up to be sure no one had heard. No one had. _That’s what you get for working while distracted,_ he thought. He winced against the sharp pain as he pulled the tool from the heel of his hand. It took only a second or two before the blood started the bead into a red droplet on his skin. Nothing for it now than to go see Doctor Bashir.

“Mister Garak! Good Morning. How can I help you?”

Garak wasn’t a particular fan of this nurse. He didn’t even know her name, but she grated on him. She was young, and Bajoran, and she always seemed so _bright._ He couldn’t very well be openly unkind to her, but the sweetness dripping from her words made him want to be.

“I seem to have injured myself in the course of my work this morning,” he said, as kindly as he could muster. “Is the good doctor in?”

The Bajoran girl made the appropriate face of empathetic sadness at hearing he had been injured. “Is he ever not in?” she asked, replacing the sad expression with a smile and a giggle. “Have a seat. I’ll let him know you’re here.”

Garak perched himself on a biobed and waited. He didn’t have to wait long before Julian appeared, almost as bright as the nurse.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, already clearly examining Garak from a distance, searching for signs of injury or illness.

“I seem to have made a rather foolish mistake this morning” – Garak held out his hand, which was bleeding more noticeably – “and stabbed myself with a seam ripper.”

Julian took his hand without hesitation, and carefully examined the wound.

Garak felt something. Julian was so gentle, all of the time. It was just his way. And now, as Garak felt the doctor’s fingers tracing softly over his hand, he was forced to face what he had been dutifully hiding from himself earlier.

“It’s a deep puncture, but it’s small,” Julian proclaimed. “I’ll have you back to your sewing in just a moment.”

“Thank you, Doctor.”

Garak didn’t say anything else. He couldn’t. He was too busy focusing on the sensation. Julian gently wiped the blood from his hand with a damp cloth, and passed a sterilizing instrument over the wound, before healing it in a matter of seconds with a dermal regenerator. And like that, any trace of the injury was gone. It took 2 or 3 minutes at most, and Garak had to muster all his skill to not look disappointed that he had been healed so easily.

“Good as new,” Julian assured him with one of his warm smiles. Garak caught himself staring at the hand for a moment, before finally hearing the words that had been spoken to him.

“Thank you, Doctor. You are as skillful as always. Now – if you’ll excuse me, my work calls.”

Julian agreed with a deferential nod and stepped away. Garak couldn’t stop staring at his hand. Upon returning to his shop, he found himself not working but simply sitting, looking at his hand in the light. There was nothing to see on it at all. All trace of the injury was gone, and it was now simply an unremarkable hand. Garak looked at it like you look at the dark part of the sky where lightning used to be. He could still feel Julian’s touch, gentle and tender and careful, as he had examined and cleaned the wound. Garak could also feel, as much as he didn’t want to admit it, the complete absence of the discomfort he had felt before. That was all he needed – all he had needed from the beginning. To be touched. Not just to be touched, but to be touched _affectionately_. Garak could invent plenty of reasons to touch someone or to be touched. He could go strike up a conversation and shake a few hands, but it wasn’t anywhere near the same. Julian’s touch was different. There was meaning in it, even when the context didn’t really warrant that. It was just how Julian was, all the time, with everyone. Garak would have loved to convince himself that the Doctor’s tenderness was reserved for him alone, but he knew it wasn’t anywhere near true. This was just Julian being Julian. It felt so good, though. The doctor’s fingertips on his hand had felt so _good,_ and even more so, the few minutes of contact had well and truly cured him of the squirming discomfort that had been plaguing him.

He filed this knowledge away in his mind, for potential further use.

# Injury Two – 13 Days Later

That nurse was still here. Garak wondered if he could find a way to never have to speak to her again. The saccharine whine in her high voice was almost too much to handle. But he was precisely where he wanted to be, perched on a Biobed. Julian gave him another one of his warm, concerned faces as he approached.

“What seems to be the problem this afternoon, Garak?” he asked, doctoral tone in full effect.

Garak presented his arm. This time there were burns, small and only second degree, but very much real, dotted up it. Julian took the arm and began carefully passing his tricorder over it while he waited for the explanation.

“The Chief asked for my help working through some old Cardassian technology in one of the upper pilons. I was happy to help him of course, but some of the old security fields were still around and they didn’t take kindly to our work. There were…sparks.”

It was all true.

“I tried to pull my arm away in time, but unfortunately we didn’t have much warning.”

That was less true.

Garak grumbled inside as he watched Julian study the burned arm with his tricorder instead of his hands. He was very intent on those readouts, and for good reason. _If you don’t put that tricorder down I will have gotten burned for nothing,_ Garak thought, but did not say. Julian did put the tricorder down, finally, but only pick up his dermal regenerator again. Garak debated what would be required to destroy every dermal regenerator on the station. There was one in every medkit, and there were medkits everywhere…

He was halfway through doing the math on the effort required when Julian proclaimed the burned arm healed.

“Oh…thank you. Efficient as always, Doctor.”

Julian wondered if the fleeting expression he caught on Garak’s face was…disappointment? It was there and gone in a flash but there had been something, and it had looked properly like some kind of sadness. Julian thought fast – about what exactly he had said and about the look on Garak’s face. He ventured to test his theory, and ran his hand demonstratively down Garak’s arm, lingering over the places that had been burned. He paid careful attention to the look on Garak’s face as he did so.

Garak exhaled deeply as he felt Julian’s hand on his arm. Julian noticed. He noticed, too, that Garak seemed to almost smile. He knew he remembered where the small burns had been – and scrambled together an idea.

“These weren’t too bad,” he explained, and carefully traced his fingers around where the two smaller burns had been. “But this one” – he was more or less drawing on Garak’s arm, at this point – “Was a little more severe. Thankfully none of them were too serious, though.”

Garak was in heaven. He wasn’t even sure what the Doctor was saying. He was fairly sure it was something about how bad the burns had been. It was simply impossible to focus on the words when presented with the sensation of Julian’s touch. Just like before, Julian was gentle with his hands, obviously careful about how he touched Garak, obviously careful about how he touched anyone. Even if you didn’t know the man, it was impossible to watch Julian interact with a patient without seeing the wheels turning in his head with regards to how he could avoid hurting them in any way. And just like before, Garak wanted to melt into the feeling. It felt good in a way Garak wasn’t even all that familiar with – not like sex but like safety. The sting of those embers catching his arm was definitely worth it.

# Injury Three – 21 Days Later

 _This is a bad and dangerous idea._ Garak’s good sense told him what he was about to do was a dumb, dumb thing. But the feeling had come back, the squirmy, uncomfortable feeling. _This is the only way you make that go away,_ he told himself. _There’s no one else who will touch you like he does. Get it over with._

He approached the Klingon. He had no idea who this Klingon was, but he looked angry and drunk. Exactly what Garak needed.

“Excuse me,” Garak said, sidling up next to the drunken man.

“What do you _want_ ,” the Klingon hissed in return.

“I need…a favor. An odd one. One I think you might enjoy. There’s latinum in it for you.”

With that the Klingon perked up. “Tell me more,” he answered, suddenly quiet, as if he was only now afraid of discovery.

“I need you to hit me.”

“What?”

“It’s a very long story,” Garak said, having in himself absolutely no plans to give any more detail about his motives. “But I need someone to punch me. Hard.”

“Never mind the latinum – that will be a reward in itself.”

From sitting on a biobed to lying in one. This was getting more entertaining. It also hurt. A lot.

“What happened to you?!” Julian asked, clearly concerned. Garak had become a frequent patient, to be sure, but he was usually sitting, cradling his hand, or his arm. Today he was horizontal, and he looked, from the expression on his face, to be in significantly more pain than he had been during his previous appearances.

“I got in the middle of a fight,” Garak flat out lied, abandoning all attempts at even part of the truth. “Got punched…” he stammered. Speaking hurt. “By a Klingon…”

Julian pulled out a tricorder – and stopped. Put it away again. Stepped closer his patient.

“No tricorder today, Doctor?” Garak asked, hoping the anxiety would blend with the pain in his voice.

“…They don’t work very well on Cardassians, especially not for internal injuries,” Julian lied through his teeth. Garak couldn’t tell if it was a true statement or not. “Where did he punch you?”

Garak vaguely indicated his ribs.

“Alright. I need to be sure nothing is broken, and then we can go from there. Get undressed, please.”

Julian hoped he was reading this right, and simultaneously hoped he wasn’t. He watched Garak’s face carefully as he made that last request. If he was right, Garak would be almost happy to remove his clothing. He didn’t want to be right. It would mean – well, Julian wasn’t quite sure. That Garak had gotten himself hurt on purpose? That he was lying? On the other side of the coin, Julian knew Garak was private. Shy. Generally not happy about being undressed, in any context. And the truth was, Julian could have easily learned everything he needed to know in a few seconds with a tricorder, and Garak would have never had to undress at all. If his suspicions were wrong he was simply putting his patient through some very real embarrassment entirely unnecessarily. But he suspected, quite strongly, that he had become part of a game, and he was doing his best to play by the rules.

Garak was more than willing to strip to his underwear. Julian felt his stomach drop. He was right, he was sure now. His patient now undressed and laid out before him, Julian considered his next steps. He could see the bruise on Garak’s ribs. It was large and already turning purple.

“Like I said, I need to know if you’ve got any broken ribs. Whether they’re broken or just bruised, this is probably going to hurt. Sorry,” Julian apologized.

“I understand.”

Garak braced for the pain. He braced for the touch, too. Julian wrapped his hand around the bruised portion of Garak’s ribs and pressed down with his fingers, feeling for motion in the bones. Garak winced. Julian hadn’t been lying. It hurt. But somewhere in there it felt soothing, too. The Doctor’s touch on his hands and arms was lovely, but feeling those hands on ribs was different. There was an intimacy about being touched in a place like this, and it made the experience all the more effective. His ribs were sore, yes, but now the squirmy, touch-starved discomfort was not only gone but replaced by a quiet warmth. Julian released his pressure on the bone, apparently content, but deliberately held his hand where it was, cupped gently around Garak’s ribs.

“They’re not broken,” Julian reassured. “Only bruised. You’ll be sore for a while, but there’s no major damage.”

Garak nodded, relieved that his very dumb choices had not actually endangered his life. Julian’s hand was warm and soothing against the tender spot on his ribs. Julian wondered if he would be breaking his oath not to fix this when it was within his power. Garak didn’t _need_ to suffer. He had instruments that could heal the bruises both on Garak’s skin and his ribs. But he suspected that that wasn’t actually what Garak wanted from him. Would it be unethical just to let this hurt?

He silently brainstormed for an idea as he stood, and gently rubbed the purple spot on Garak’s side with his thumb while he thought. It was the least he could do, and he watched Garak’s face as he did. Garak had his eyes closed now, and the look of pain on his face had been replaced by a quiet happiness. Julian had an idea. He wondered if it was too close to asking Garak to admit to the game, but he didn’t see a way forwards for himself without some kind of consent from his patent.

“I have instruments that could heal this,” he said. “I could have this bruise gone in only a few seconds. But…I have some analgesic cream I could put on it, which would work almost as well, if you’d rather that option.”

Garak’s stomach twisted. He hadn’t realized until this moment exactly how thoroughly he had been found out. Julian _knew._ He did. But, Garak realized, he had made the offer anyway. Was he…accommodating? Playing along?

“I…think I prefer the second option better,” Garak stammered.

“I thought you might,” Julian answered. Was he smiling? Garak was sure he was, a little. There was just a hint of something at the corners of his mouth that was hard to ignore.

“I’ll be right back,” Julian promised, and then was, disappearing only for a moment to return with a tube of pinkish gel in his hands. He squeezed a small amount of it onto his fingers and gently dabbed it onto the slowly darkening purple patch on Garak’s side. “This is still bruised,” Julian explained, wanting to be completely sure he was being forthright with his patient. “I’m going to be as gentle as I can, but since the area is tender, this may hurt a bit.”

“That…will be quite alright, Doctor.”

Garak emptied his mind of everything else and soaked in the feeling as Julian began to rub the ointment into his skin in slow, soft circles. The substance, whatever it was, was cool and soothing against the injury – and even more so as applied by Julian’s hands. He had been telling the truth, though – it did hurt, a bit. Not badly, and not the whole time. But every time Julian’s fingers grazed the bone itself Garak was greeted with a dull thrum of pain. And he was…okay with it. He wasn’t quite sure why. He had never considered himself a fan of pain – at least not his own. But now there was something almost relieving in the rhythmic moments of soreness as Julian rubbed those slow circles into his skin.

If he had thought about it a little harder, it would have made sense eventually. What it was – though Garak did not have the words to name it – was exposure therapy. Pain without fear. After a life like his own Garak had never known pain that did not also come with fear. Pain meant injury, or torture, or capture, or death. Pain never stood on its own, but always came with anxiety and shaky terror. But this pain was _safe_. There was no danger here, nothing to fear, no state secrets to keep hidden. It reminded him, with every small, sore moment, that he was being cared for, and touched by friendly hands. And even more so his brain was learning that maybe pain isn’t the worst thing in the world, maybe pain is inherently unpleasant but it need not be feared for the fear it itself creates. Maybe that was one less anxiety for Garak’s daily life.

All of that would have been there, somewhere, in his head – but he was definitely too far into the warm euphoria to notice. Julian lingered a little longer than he needed to, continuing to rub circles into Garak’s skin for a few minutes after the medication was well and truly absorbed. He wasn’t quite sure why, but Garak certainly seemed to be enjoying it, and he wasn’t one to argue with anything he did that seemed to bring any level of comfort to anyone, even if it was unorthodox.

“That should help the pain,” he said finally, when he was content that he done all he could do to soothe the injury. Garak was somewhat surprised to find that whatever the stuff Julian had been rubbing into his skin had been, it had actually worked, and he could now move without pain.

“Next time,” Julian said, or maybe admonished, as Garak slowly got dressed again, “Try not to hurt yourself too badly, okay? I’ll…” – it was very difficult to find the words to express his point without saying too much, and definitely embarrassing his patient – “I’ll treat anything. It doesn’t have to be broken, you know. Or bleeding. Or even…visible.”

“I will endeavor to remember that, Doctor,” Garak answered. That felt – it _really_ felt – like an invitation to just fake something. He wondered if it was sincere.

# Injury Four – 33 Days Later

“I haven’t had the pleasure of having you as a patient in quite a while,” Julian said with a smile. He didn’t even have a tricorder on him, this time. He felt sure he didn’t need one. Garak weakly returned the smile. The squirmy feeling was back, and so here he was. He struggled to contain his anxiety. He was a good liar, the BEST liar, but he wasn’t used to telling lies when he already knew the other party knew that was exactly what they were.

“I’ve been very lucky, Doctor. No injuries for me as of late. However, I have had some pains” – he realized he hadn’t actually chosen a lie, and quickly made a decision about where he wanted Julian’s hands – “in my stomach, as of late. I don’t think it’s anything serious, but I figured…you might want to give me a once over.”

Julian had never been so happy to have someone turn up with such an obviously false complaint. Garak had understood his suggestion perfectly, and Julian was overwhelmingly relieved to know that he hadn’t resorted to hurting himself, either accidentally or deliberately.

“Of course,” he answered with a smile. “Undress and lie down, and I’ll be happy to take a look at you.”

Garak was perfectly content to do that. Julian knew what he was part of, now, and was more than happy to play along. He made a show of taking Garak’s pulse, pressing his fingers into his neck, and pressing a hand into Garak’s chest to feel his heart. That an almost useless way of checking a heart, on a clinical level, but clinical accuracy was not what they were here for. Content with basic vitals, he moved on, rambling about medical details for the sake of accuracy.

“The biggest concern with new or unexplainable abdominal pains in an undiagnosed internal injury,” he began, resting a hand on Garak’s stomach. “Manual palpation is a fairly reliable way to determine that.”

Garak nodded, unwilling to interrupt his doctor.

“In other words, I’m going to press on your stomach. This may be uncomfortable, but it shouldn’t hurt – please let me know if anything does.”

“I will,” Garak added, distractedly. He sank into the biobed as Julian pressed his hands into his stomach. It was better than the ribs, even. He felt the tension in his body unfurling as the hanging discomfort dissolved, just as it always did upon feeling Julian’s touch. There was something strangely intimate about being touched on the stomach, and it was easy, almost, for Garak to pretend that someone was actually close to him. That he wasn’t lying in an infirmary, faking an illness for a few minutes of affectionate contact. It was very nice contact, but he felt a pang of sadness that this was all he had. For all of his theatrics and deliberate tactility, even Julian could only drag the exam on for so long before the framework became unconvincing, and eventually he had to let Garak go with a clean bill of health. Garak was thrilled that his completely faked illness had not bothered the Doctor in the least, but it was over far too soon just the same. Garak found himself unexpectedly sad, as he sat in his quarters later that evening. He was discovering, with some annoyance, that while the quiet understanding he had developed with Julian did a wonderful job of taking the edge off that touch starvation in the moment, it seemed to come back harder when it did. He was getting – he was loathe to consider it – used to it, used to Julian’s touch, accustomed to that tenderness, and now he felt its absence even more keenly.

# Not An Injury At All – 7 days later

It was beginning to get truly late when Garak’s doorbell chimed.

He sat up a little from where he was reclined on his sofa, and ventured a cautious invitation towards the door. “Come in?”

He had no idea who he had expected to see in the doorway, but it definitely was _not_ the Doctor. It was even more not the Doctor in clothes that were not his uniform.

“Doctor Bashir! How nice to see you. What brings you around to my quarters?”

Julian stepped into the room. Garak had to take a moment to take him in. He wasn’t sure if he had ever seen Julian in anything other than uniform before, but here he was, all blue-grey undershirt and soft lounge pants, hovering just inside the doorway.

“Professional responsibility,” Julian answered. “And…personal concern.”

“Do tell!”

“You’ve got a condition, Garak. And I think I may need to employ some more unorthodox methods to treat it.”

“I assure you, Doctor, that whatever I have previously presented with, I am currently in perfect health.”

Julian crossed the room to sit on the end of the sofa Garak was lying on. Garak was doing an admirable job of containing his anxiety. He had a feeling he was about to get a talking to, for wasting medical resources or just for wasting Julian’s time, or about the ethical quandaries of faking an illness, or deliberately hurting oneself. Instead, Julian hesitantly reached down and rested his hand on Garak’s ankle.

“You’re touch starved, Garak. It’s a real thing, you know. It’s not just in your head. People…we’re meant to touch each other. Our bodies _need_ touch. It’s perfectly natural to seek it.”

“And…is this a medical opinion? Are you telling me this because your oath binds you to cure the sick, no matter the context?”

“I’ll say yes, if that’s what you want me to say. We can keep this game going forever, if you want. I can be a doctor right now, if that makes you more comfortable. You don’t even have to acknowledge a word I’m saying right now. We can keep this charade running forever. But…no. Of course it’s not just professional. It never was.”

 _Oh_. There were so many emotions rumbling in Garak’s chest. Could he allow himself to believe, even for a moment, that someone might…actually care for him? Certainly not.

“Besides,” Julian continued, “If I was here in a strictly professional context, I would have worn my uniform.”

“And why aren’t you, on that note?”

“Because this is softer.”

“I…I’m not sure what you want me to say, Doctor.”

“You don’t have to say anything. I certainly won’t make you. I won’t make you _do_ anything, either. But what I want – and what I think you want, too – is for you to take off that shirt, and lie down, and let me rub your back.”

“Why on earth are you doing this?”

“Is it that hard for you to believe I might actually care about you?”

Garak took a moment to prepare himself for the words. “Yes.”

“For that…for that I’m very sorry. You don’t have to believe me, if you can’t. But I really do want to help you – however you prefer to interpret my motives.”

It was…too much. Too real. Too much honesty to say. But the offer was so impossibly tempting that even if the words were out of reach, the actions weren’t. Garak cautiously removed his top, and turned his attention back to Julian, who was sitting, cross legged and expectant, on the end of the sofa. Garak studied the sofa and Julian and the geometry of the thing sank in, and he quickly realized that the only way Julian was going to be able to reach his back, in this configuration, would be if his head was squarely in the Doctor’s lap.

Nothing had ever sounded nicer.

“You…want me to…” he began, not able to handle finishing the sentence.

“I told you,” Julian confirmed. “I wore soft pants for a reason.”

There were a few minutes of nervous shuffling, and then Garak was in the strangest, and most comfortable, position he had ever been in in his life, resting on his side with his cheek pressed into Julian’s thigh. He barely avoided making a small, contented noise when Julian pressed his hand into the soft scales that covered Garak’s back, and began to rub them gently, carefully following their grain.

“I think, Doctor, I might be cured,” Garak said softly. Julian chuckled, just a little. “What, may I ask, is your prescription for my…condition?

“Lots of this, I should think,” the Doctor answered smugly. He moved his hands slightly, and ran one gently down the ridges on Garak’s spine. Garak was quietly glad no one in the world could see his face. It felt _wonderful_. Garak wondered if Julian knew that the ridges he was so gently running his hands across were extremely sensitive. He wondered if he understood that for a non-Cardassian to touch those bony protrusions was almost a taboo, because rarely did any other species know how to handle them without causing pain. He wondered if he knew that having those ridges stroked so gently was euphoric. Had he been looking at Julian’s face, he would have had absolutely no doubt: he knew. Julian had looked it all up, a few hours before, because of course he had. This was not a treatment he had any intention of going into without a full knowledge of what he was doing. Garak wondered, too, why he wasn’t more awkward about the situation. The presence of those sensitive ridges made the back a part of the body that held a strange place in Cardassian culture. It wasn’t inherently sexual, but it was considered extremely intimate, and it was normally extremely taboo to have one’s back touched by anyone other than a family member or a sexual partner. But this was…fine, somehow. Wonderful. Soothing.

And Elim Garak, curled up on that sofa, did something for the first time ever in his long life. Without meaning to, he fell asleep.


End file.
